The "house" is on fire. I'm talking about the "house" that our ancestors fought and died to build. That house has provided shelter and refuge to the beneficiaries of the Civil Rights movement, but will it provide the same to future leaders and communities of color across the US. 

 

The political resegregation of the south, the emergence of Jim Crow voter barriers, the unwarranted practice of voter purging, and constant attacks on the Voting Rights Act & Civil Rights Act create a recipe of poison for minorities across the south athirst for representation and justice. Voter engagement in 2012 is not only about voter registration and education, but this is IT, in terms of saving what little freedom African Americans and people of color have fought to exercise in America. 

 

Positive political change is needed. The only way it can happen is through creating voter education and voter mobilization efforts across the nation. We have to begin to make political civic engagement a part of our everyday lifestyle unless we will have given back every "right" we have ever fought to have. 

 

As we venture closer and closer to Fall elections the social climate is ever growing more and more racially charged and polarized, fueled by widespread voter suppression laws being implemented across the nation. The air is also ripe for community engagement, as well as an opportunity to share our popular education tools to educate community members. 

 

We can foster positive social change through education and advocacy, while sharing relevant and timely information to community stake-holders in hope of them making informed decisions while voting in 2012. Voter engagement is how we, not only protect our rights, its how we create more, and prevent laws that impede our rights. Through exercising our right to vote we can create the positive political change needed to grow and sustain our communities.